A path forward
by Alphawave
Summary: Pathfinder finds out a little more about himself when he participates in the Apex Games Preliminaries. Set before the cinematic trailer.


A path forward

MRVN units didn't believe in destiny. Well, to be fair, MRVN units didn't really believe in anything. Both in the past and to this day, MRVNs were designed to do what they were created to do, and that was to serve humans. That being said, for this particular MRVN unit, it felt like a series of incredibly fortunate events had led up to this moment, this opportunity to participate in the Apex Games. These strange, mathematically impossible, coincidental events could only have been the result of design, perhaps by his creator or by someone (or even something) else. Did it matter? Absolutely not, but the recently named Pathfinder was going to find his destiny, find his creator, and have fun. And he was going to do that by entering the Apex Games.

After all, it had the word 'Games' in it. That must mean it would be fun, right?

Well, the answer to that question was unfortunately rather complicated to answer. The people who watched the Apex Games have begun to see him in a favourable light but his fellow competitors in the preliminaries looked at him with some suspicion. After all, a MRVN unit—let alone a modified MRVN unit with scouting abilities—participating in the Apex Games? What gives? As such, despite his attempts at befriending everybody, the competitors gave Pathfinder a wide berth, avoiding eye contact with him whenever possible.

There was one man in particular who was very unfriendly to Pathfinder. In the lobby minutes before they were to enter the dropship, a rude man shoved his way past Pathfinder. He looked around, his white beard whipping around before landing on Pathfinder. More specifically, he was looking at the space next to Pathfinder, a small little corner that was far enough away from the bragging mercenaries and psychopaths.

Pathfinder turned his head to the stranger, observing them curiously. Their white beard and sagging face and red hat made Pathfinder think of Santa Claus. He extended his hand, a smiley emoticon appearing on his chest monitor.

"Hello, friend. My name is Pathfinder. What is yours?"

"You don't know who I am? Me?! Are your circuits fried?"

Pathfinder obviously did not know but did not take the insult to heart. "Are you Santa Claus?"

"W-what? No! I'm Red Alert, the creeping monstrosity, previous winner of the Apex Games!"

Pathfinder did not know who this man was but he didn't look like a Red Alert. He was too old and too chubby faced, despite the many menacing tattoos that trailed down from his shoulders to his wrist, the rest hiding away behind well-worn gloves. One of the tattoos was older than the others, baring the original skull insignia for the Frontier Militia.

He turned up to his new-found friend. "I will call you Santa Claus."

"What?!" spluttered the newly-christened Santa Claus.

"I will call you Santa Claus, because it is a jolly name, and you look like a jolly man."

The man grumbled some rude words under his breath. The muscles of his arm tightened, making the various violent imagery move with clenched fury. Santa Claus stared at Pathfinder with the heat of a reactor core. An image file of a strange man with curly hair and soft eyes flashed before Pathfinder for 0.46 seconds. He did not know what to make of that random image, other than he had a faint suspicion that it might be his creator. A heart emoji appeared on Pathfinder's chest.

"Don't get chummy with me," Santa Claus snarled. "Soon as we get into that battlefield, I'm gonna find you and rip you piece by piece, and I'm gonna enjoy every slow second of it."

"I will be very impressed if you can do that, for I am made of metal. I will also be having fun on the battlefield."

"Oh yeah? How?"

The grinning emoji appeared on Pathfinder's chest. "By winning, of course."

At that moment, an official told them the dropship was ready. All participants were to enter the dropship. Santa Claus's ears perked at this announcement, shoving his way past Pathfinder and a few other people as he made his way inside. Pathfinder did not shove his way in like so many others, instead calmly walking in, one of the last to enter.

As the ship began preparing for takeoff, Santa Claus was fiddling with the straps of his jetpack. They locked eyes. When Pathfinder waved, Santa Claus made a cutting motion with his throat. Pathfinder turned his head away.

This wasn't what Pathfinder thought of when he imagined entering the Apex Games, but it definitely promised to be interesting. And fun, of course, he reminded himself.

The dropship hovered over King's Canyon. The pilot put out an ETA for the drop of one minute. The rules of the preliminaries were simple and had not changed in the many years that the Apex Games existed. The preliminary rounds are for solo members only, and emerging the champion will take you to the next round. Multiple preliminary rounds were being held in different planets all over the Outlands, with the champions of each banding together for the main Apex Games event a month away from now.

All around Pathfinder were two types of people: the nervous and the hardened. The former were mostly newcomers, or physically weaker in stature. They stared at the large drop apprehensively, fear clouding their eyes. The hardened took on a variety of forms but they were generally either very cocky or stoic. Pathfinder scanned these people, calculating the probability he will win this round. Unfortunately, he did not have a number. There were too many unknowns, and also Pathfinder had never used a gun before.

But he'll surely pick it up quickly, right? He could feel it in his blueprints.

Santa Claus abruptly shoved Pathfinder aside. "Move aside, asshole," he grunted, putting on his ruby tinted goggles before jumping off the plane.

"Hey, wait for me!" Pathfinder cried, following chase. He jumped off the plane, doing an accidental but still showstopping somersault before activating his jetpack. He zoomed to the ground, following Santa Claus's chem trail to the centre of the island.

He landed amongst the huts and stared in awe at his new surroundings. It's beauty like he'd never seen, a mixture of crudely made shacks and perfectly molded mountain ranges. Rivers of clear water mixed with red blood flowed beneath him. And then he heard it, a single gunshot, followed by another, then more, all coming in different directions.

Before the exclamation emoji can appear on his chest, a full-blown gunfight warred all around him, and he was standing in the middle of it without a weapon.

With his grappling hook, he quickly hooked to one of the huts, swinging himself over there and sliding inside with remarkable grace. This was where the looting began. The basics of combat required that he needed a weapon to survive, but there was nothing here, just a mix of ammo, health kits and shield cells, which he still picked up just in case. The gunfight was raging outside, and he watched as men and women alike fall dead on the battlefield, bullets riddling their bodies and flames licking at their faces. To others, they might be repulsed but Pathfinder was intrigued by the gruesome sight, drawn into these mangled, broken ragdolls. He leaned to the window just as a smoke grenade exploded, covering the area in a plume of grey. He used the cover to escape. He wanted to have fun, and losing and dying without finding his creator was definitely not fun.

Sticking to the shadows, Pathfinder grappled and sneaked his way into houses, looking for weapons but to no avail. Everybody had arrived earlier and looted this entire area. The only thing he had found was an arc star and a thermal grenade in his hands, and even though they were technically weapons in their own right, they did not feel right in his hands. They did not fit. He ran out of the houses and checked his map. The ring was to the east. He headed in that direction.

"Attention: new kill leader."

As Pathfinder climbed up a small hill, he saw a computer screen showing Santa Claus up on the board. Already he had killed 4 people, and was the Champion to beat as well. His sickly grin looked terrible on the monitor and his stomach protruded from his chest armour. It was true what they say about TV: it does add kilos to a person. More than that, however, Santa had the most points by miles. If Pathfinder wanted any chance of winning, it didn't matter how many people he killed, he had to kill the champion first. He had to find Santa Claus and kill him before someone else did.

"But I need a weapon," Pathfinder sighed, a blue frowny face flashing on his chest.

As if by the wills of the gods (or perhaps the sponsors) a care package dropped not far from Pathfinder, right by some crates. He opened the crates and the care package. Level 1 body armour and helmets and more ammo, but more importantly he had two weapons: a shotgun and a sniper rifle. His hands reach first for the sniper rifle and electricity crackled within his mainframe.

He felt a strange sense of ease and comfort in the gun's sleek design and shape, as if it was created for his hands. So many unidentifiable emotions spring forward from nowhere, overwhelming his systems. So many unidentifiable emotions, but they all felt good. This weapon felt right in his hands. Instantaneously, he knew what to do.

He put the shotgun behind his back and gave a testing glance down the newly equipped scope of his sniper rifle. Santa Claus was running up to two other contestants locked in combat about 100 metres away. He pulled out a strange gun and fired it at them. The bullet exploded into red fireworks and the other two were temporarily blinded. In their confusion, Santa Claus put a bullet between their eyes. Red Alert. Santa Claus. That was probably why he chose the former moniker and not the latter. He did not give presents. A pity, Pathfinder thought.

With Santa out in the open, Pathfinder grabbed the opportunity presented. He aimed his sniper rifle at Santa Claus and fired three shots. Two hit, but the third missed. The bullets were absorbed by Santa Claus's body armour. Even from this distance, Pathfinder could see that familiar red-hot rage in the old human's eyes. Pathfinder made a zipline and sped his way to Santa, pointing his shotgun at him.

"You!" Santa Claus snarled. "I will kill you!"

He pointed his flare gun at Pathfinder, but he was quick to dodge and follow it up with a shotgun round to the side. Santa Claus snarled, swapping the flare gun for a submachine gun, cackling maniacally as he sprayed bullets haphazardly. Pathfinder used his grapple, trying to grab the ledge but instead aimed too low. The grapple aimed at Santa Claus's abdomen, pulling him to Pathfinder, to his confusion.

"What? H-hey!"

Pathfinder put a shotgun round into Santa Claus's stomach, sending him flying. The old man lied curled up on the ground, clutching himself in pain, his body armour ripped to shreds. Blood dripped from his lips to the ground and when he saw it, his eyes widened in horror. He stared at the growing pool of blood by his hands, then up at Pathfinder.

"P-please. No."

A red snarling face appeared on Pathfinder's chest, but his voice was cheerful as always. "Don't die on my watch. Die by my hands."

"N-no!"

Pathfinder levelled the shotgun at his head and pulled the trigger. As he saw Santa Claus's head explode into a thousand pieces, he felt something spark within his mainframe. It's a new emotion, one that spoke of comfort and happiness and home. At once, Pathfinder realized that this was his true calling. He was a killing machine, and he enjoyed it a lot. This was what he was created for. This was meant to be.

The rest of the match passed by and Pathfinder accrued 5 more kills. He emerged the Champion to everybody's surprise and quickly became a fan favourite by the public. He did not get the answers he wanted from the preliminaries, but he got something better. He had found a sense of purpose to believe in, and learned a bit more about himself as well. He learned that he liked grappling, water, holding guns, and killing people. And as he enjoyed the fame from his rapidly growing fanbase, as the next round of the Apex Games loomed heavily in the air, he learned one more thing about himself.

He really liked winning.


End file.
